No End In Sight...
Talks are ongoing. There are demands and counter-demands. Hints at concessions, and implacable denials of possibility. The goal is hugely required, needfully determined, perpetually elusive. Both sides, traditional antagonists, require a final settling of accounts. There is a legitimate grievance on both sides.But the brutality of the burden of tribal grievance, bitter resentment and a traditional culture that is more familiar with bombastic threats and real-life carnage resulting from mindlessly bloody assaults, make the bargaining for peace arduous beyond expectation. Simply put, there are some issues that cannot be negotiable, since they benefit one side disproportionately, leaving the other helpless to order and defend its very existence.
A just solution remains an optimistic phrase, a hoped-for result in a faint atmosphere of reality. There is the authority on one side of an unstable government atop a successfully capable nation resiliently reliant on their immense resource capital of people dedicated to survival. On the other side, a covert terror group posing as a legitimate voice of governance for an ill-done-by population.
The reality is that the facade of civility fronting the Palestinian Authority belies the reality of their conviction that they are the rightful owners of the entire geography upon which the State of Israel is based, and beyond. The reality is that their overtures meant for international approval belie their underground activities which teach the young hatred and promise the population a return to a time that never existed.
The inalienable rights they demand as theirs would ultimately destroy the legitimate state they bargain with, promising a fair and just outcome. While balking at reasonable and moderate halfway measures that should effectively satisfy demands from either side. The "right of return" of a population that has arisen from the original refugee population is manifestly impossible.
The PA's current chief negotiator has placed a new demand on the long list currently being negotiated in status talks with Israel. The requirement of the Palestinian Authority to have an army to defend the new Arab state, the nascent state of Palestine whose existence is to become reality on satisfying the needs on both sides for security. Defend the new Arab state? From whom and from what?
The PA source that divulged this new demand elaborated, "This isn't an army intended to launch an attack against Israel. We are not asking for F-16 jets, but rather a force that would be able to defend the nation from threats and realize its basic right to exist in security." Their purported need for security, however, may result in the lack of security for the neighbour with whom they share a near proximity.
This apprehension was not alleviated by the source who left the security issue unelaborated. The demand appears to be in clear violation of all previous agreements which stipulate that any future Palestinian Authority state would be a demilitarized one. Israel, understandably, would be rather unsettled by the reality of an armed military force alongside her borders. Particularly given the unclear agenda of the PA.
The Palestinian Authority in fact, has an existing security force. As they did before the first Intifada. A force partially trained and equipped by Israel. A force which interacted with Israeli security agencies. Before the Intifada turned them once again into enemies and violence bloomed again through unending bloodshed that only the Security Wall halted. The current security force of the PA has yet to prove itself.
It has, in fact, proven itself inadequate or/and unwilling to the task of apprehending assaults against Israeli interests. It has, under the guidance of the PA authority, relinquished its role on numerous occasions when it has suited the PA. Releasing prisoners guilty of murder of Israelis, or of planned and/or executed assaults. Are they prepared to put a stop to the rocket attacks from Gaza, where some of Fatah's own affiliated militias still operate?
And the random attacks against Israeli civilians, will they be taken seriously enough by the PA security force in solidarity with the legitimacy of a neighbour's peaceful existence and security needs? Will it concern itself with the rampages of rioting Palestinians who attack their neighbours? Who throw rocks at Israeli vehicles, who set fire to farm and Kibbutz crops just before harvest?
This is an ongoing, year-by-year problem. Will it be resolved through the resolve of the PA security forces? In the interests of reciprocity, given that volunteers are often sent from Kibbutzim to accompany local Palestinians during the olive harvest, to help protect them from similar assaults from misguided Israeli sources?
Will the demands from the PA negotiators just keep increasing, going beyond the division of Jerusalem, the issue of "refugee return", borders, settlements, water and security - and now an army - stop any time soon? Mahmoud Abbas is quite concise about the 2,400 square miles of the West Bank and Gaza Strip the new state for the Palestinians requires.
Which is to say, the Gaza Strip, West Bank, east Jerusalem and areas along the West Bank frontier representing the pre-1967 war no-man's land. Offering for this largess on Israel's part, exactly what? Guarantees of future non-aggression?
To succeed in that, the PA would have to put the brakes on its commitment up to now in teaching Palestinian children to dread and hate their neighbours, to commit to future warfare against them. It would have to do an abrupt about-face in its up-to-now promises to Palestinians that the PA will secure the entirety of the territory - including that on which Israel sits - as their very own promised land of the future.
Perhaps that can happen, but in the meantime, based on the reality of current conditions and the situation as it unfolds, it seems remote at best, impossible in the worst-case scenario. And then what exactly? The searingly violent and never-ending hostilities re-commence with the fury of failed expectations.
Labels: Israel, Middle East, Traditions
posted by Pieface @ Monday, May 19, 2008
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